The present invention relates to a tool for holding a wheel bearing or a wheel bearing seal of a vehicle wheel. It also relates to a method of installing/mounting or maintaining a vehicle wheel and a set of vehicle wheels using such a tool. It is applicable in the fields of aircraft manufacture as well as aircraft maintenance.
An aircraft comprises several undercarriages, each constituting a set of one or more wheels. During the manufacture of the aircraft, each wheel must be placed on its stub axle in order to allow it to be fixed subsequently. The same type of operation must be carried out during the maintenance of the aircraft.
When the aircraft is very large, the weights moved during mounting are high, while the operations of orienting and positioning the wheel hub on the stub axle are extremely precise.
In particular, it has been observed that, during mounting, a dynamic effect of the stub axle on the wheel bearing that equips the wheel leads to the ejection of the wheel bearing or, more specifically, the wheel bearing seal that protects it from the outside. When such a situation occurs in the aeronautical field, a non-conformity is raised in the manufacturing process and there is then a possibility of the wheel mounting being failed by the aircraft safety authorities.
Such a situation involves significant costs and the need to re-start the mounting operation with a new wheel. Said requirement also extends the unavailability time during maintenance or the mounting time during manufacture of the aircraft.